Mobile Business Apps Aid Workforce Management, Enhance Productivity

Mobile applications for personal devices can be fun and addictive. No one would ever imagine that they could spend so much time trying to slice fruit in the air, launch pigs at different objects or try to kill zombies with flowers. There are also different business applications for mobile devices they can access to accomplish more useful tasks. Business applications can help manage a mobile workforce and enhance the productivity of field employees.

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Collaboration

Business apps can help employees interact with one another in the field and communicate with the main office. They can ask questions, access resources, ask for assistance when needed and even interact with one another through businesses social media applications. This helps the employees create a knowledge base that will improve the performance of field workers and help them to solve problems faster and more efficiently.

Field Service

Applications for field service employees can include many different ways to enhance productivity and help manage a mobile workforce. Managers can send reports on schedule changes and include information on directions between different appointments. Fieldworkers can also access and input information on performance for different service calls and this information can be accessed by management. Mobile workers can also use these business apps to clock in and clock out to help create more accurate timesheets.

Navigation

Not only do mobile workers need to know how to get to an appointment, they need to know how to get there from their previous appointment. They also need to make sure that they are aware of any traffic situations that may delay their arrival time or may require a change in their route to maintain their schedule. If there is an address discrepancy, many of these apps can also help to verify the address of customers to make sure that the employee is not driving to the wrong location.

Personal Production

Mobile business applications can include to-do lists and tasks that need to be completed in order to properly service a customer. These lists can also be updated so that the main office is aware of the progress of the employee at a specific location. If additional tasks need to be added, the status can help alert the main office that the worker may not be able to make another appointment on time. Virtual assistant mobile applications can help alert users that a new appointment time is arriving or directions to a new appointment with a list of necessary information that the employee will need to know before they arrive at a new location.

Human Resources

In order to be able to maintain a schedule of a mobile workforce, human sources needs to be aware of absences and vacation times. There are business applications available that will allow employees to notify HR when they will not be at work. If a mobile employee doesn’t come into the office on a frequent basis they may not be able to give human resources enough time to help managers rearrange schedules to make sure that all routes and appointments are covered by available personnel. Business apps can also help remind employees to clock in and clock out so that human resources can have accurate information on time and attendance records. This is important not only to help reduce overhead but also to help determine if there is a potential problem with an employee’s attendance record.

When a company’s workforce is mobile, management and productivity can be difficult to streamline. Business applications can help ease the workload of managers and coordinate efforts between departments to enhance productivity. Companies with mobile employees should look at the needs of their fieldworkers and determine which mobile business applications will help them to assist managers and enhance employee productivity.

Robert Stanley is a content producer at mobile apps for businesses at ClickSoftware.com, a company which also offers a variety of resources on capacity planning and mobile business apps.